Succarath

 




The succarath, also known as the su, was a monster Andre Thevet reported from Patagonia. The beast was described as having a very short face, similar to either that of a human or a cat. It had a red beard and lion like mane. The body was very skinny, with a deep chest in the front and narrowing to the back. The tail was very bushy and held over its back. The succarath carried its young on its back and sheltered them with its tail. The creature had long legs for running, and was quite quick and agile. The succarath was a carnivore and a capable hunter, comparable to a large cat.


While Andre Thevet was the first person to write about the succarath, he wasn’t the only one. Other explorers such as Conrad Fore, Ambroise Pare and Juan Eusebio Nieremberg all mentioned the succarath. Each of these explorers all write about the succarath as a completely natural animal, and not hearsay from local legend.


It was said that the local Tehuelche natives would hunt the succarath for its fur. But since it was so ferocious they would hunt it by setting a pit trap. The succarath would fall in and not be able to escape, where the natives could easily dispatch it with their bows from the rim. While the succarath was usually tender and caring to its pups, when trapped in the pit it was said to kill its own offspring. It was unknown why it did this, confusion, hunger from being trapped in the pit for a long time. Pedro Lozano, a Jesuit priest working in Argentina, suggested that the succarath kills its young as an act of mercy, so they don’t suffer at the hands of the hunters.


Many people have theorized about what the succarath really was, an unknown species of can or canine living in Patagonia, a fanciful inclusion by Andre Thevet that everyone else copied and pretended they saw so not to be left out. In modern times the idea of the succarath being a surviving mylodon sloth has become the go to answer in cryptozoology circles. The problem is that the succarath is a slim, fast, agile carnivore, while the mylodon was a rotund, slow, ponderous herbivore. While I’ve seen many cases of vicious and highly defensive herbivores being mistaken for carnivores, it still doesn’t change the differences in speed and shape between the two creatures.


Another thing to note was at the time the Tehuelche people hunted exclusively with bows. Even on the rare occasion that they hunted pumas it was still done with bows. They didn’t dig pits to hunt any animal. As well, they almost entirely wore skins of guanacos, the wild relatives of llamas. Other animals were rarely used in this manner. All of these details cast doubt on the reports of Thevet and other naturalists who explored Patagonia. Yet in other subjects they wrote accurately, so why would they diverge from reality on the succarath? And why would they do so with such consistent detail?



Sources


https://cryptidarchives.fandom.com/wiki/Succarath


https://patagoniamonsters.blogspot.com/2009/09/succarath-first-patagonian-monster.html


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c89L_ZIq0xg



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